#weeknotes 2020/11 (Stay in, stay well)
Who breaks everything on a pandemic?
A virus will have its own way.
What was normal feels academic,
different contours to different days;
of distancing from greetings, others,
washing hands until they suffer;
self-isolation is the game –
fail, and quarantine won’t be tame.
A society in suspension,
as we wait for the peak to land,
then flatten it as best we can,
Corona has all our attention.
And before you think home is a cell
to save people, stay in, stay well.
A poem from Rishi Dastidar’s Ticker-tape was included in The Forward Book of Poetry 2018. His second collection, Saffron Jack, is published by Nine Arches Press. He is also editor of The Craft: A Guide to Making Poetry Happen in the 21st Century (Nine Arches Press).